Strawberry Fields (Poisoned) Forever

The state that supplies 90 percent of U.S. strawberries has approved a fumigant pesticide that chemists are hesitant to handle in the lab. One more reason to buy organic. While it is unlikely that methyl iodide injected into strawberry fields pre-planting will wind up on or in the nonorganic strawberries you buy at the store, rest assured those conventionally grown berries could be teeming with other toxic compounds. That's because many chemical farmers rely on a cocktail of pesticides to help compensate for chemically destroyed soil quality. For example, according to Pesticide Action Network's What's on my food? tool, which uses U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Pesticide Data Program numbers, 55 percent of conventional strawberries contained residues of the fungicide Captan, a probable human carcinogen, according to the EPA.